Getting Fixed
by fairytalelights
Summary: /Because they'll be there for each other, as long as they need each other; and everything is the same but everything is different/ - Bunny comes home one night to find Merida curled up in his apartment, and she's just a little broken. /Because nothing is right, not anymore, and nothing will ever be okay again./ - So this is what a breaking heart feels like. (twoshot! modern!au.)
1. Chapter 1

**okay. i may be in the mood for spamming oneshots. but i really like writing this stuff. and i really like asterida. **

**this is really the incoherent ramblings of a girl with everything to do on a Saturday who can't tear herself away from her laptop. i mean, i liked writing this. i think it could've gone better. maybe one day i'll rewrite it. but i think i'll stick with this for now. **

**hope you enjoy, i guess. **

* * *

><p>Merida's broken, and Bunny's her best friend, and he's going to be around for as long as she needs./

* * *

><p>When Bunny unlocks the door of his apartment and walks in, his flat-mates Jack Frost and Flynn Rider and Lightning McQueen trailing behind him, he's certainly not expecting the lights in his room to be on and the sounds of the TV drifting out from under the door.<p>

They've all only just gotten back from the gym, and they're exhausted, but they're alert in an instant.

Quietly, they walk past the living room strewn with their clothes and their trash, the remnants of the morning's breakfast still on the kitchen counter, the mess that makes up the hallway. It's Bunny who stops in front of his door, Jack and Flynn and Lightning standing around him, and he shoves open the door with his shoulder, his eyes sharp and hard and his fists clenched.

He's not sure what he's expecting to see, exactly (what sort of idiotic burglar or thief would leave his bedroom light and the TV on?), but it's _definitely _not a familiar red-headed Scottish girl curled up on his bed in a tank top and shorts, her legs drawn up, staring blankly as _CSI _plays on the screen.

He stops short. "Merida?"

Her blue eyes reach him, looking a little sad and tired. "Hi, Bunny."

Bunny is aware of his friends peering over his shoulder into his room, where there are still old sketchbooks and paints and clothes and empty takeaway boxes dumped all over the floor and a girl curled up on his bed, and he hears Lightning mutter, "Man, she's hot."

It snaps Bunny out of his shock, and he turns around and shoves all three guys out of the room before slamming the door shut.

"Sorry about this," Merida says, and Bunny can hear the guilt in her voice, clear as day. "I just – I just needed somewhere to go. And - and you gave me a copy of your key, last time. Remember?"

Bunny nods, because he can remember passing Merida the key, telling her she can use it to get into the apartment if she ever needs somewhere to crash for the night, or just to get something. She's only been here once, when he brought her in to see it when he just moved in, nearly two years ago. She's never used her key before today.

"I didn't see Angus," he says, referring to the huge, black motorbike she's always riding.

She shrugs. "I parked it and I walked."

Her voice is quiet, low.

She looks so sad and upset that Bunny doesn't really think. He drops his bag on the floor and makes her budge up and slides next to her onto the bed and wraps his arm around her.

Merida is his best friend, has been for years, ever since high school when he thought it'd be fun to try out horse-riding and she'd been in the same class.

They'd hit it off very well (after an initial argument that Bunny still insists to this day Merida started), and even when the class was over, they still kept in touch, all the way through high school and college and their first steps into the working world. Now he's an art teacher in some prestigious art academy and she works at the stables where they met so many years ago, and somewhere in between they've developed a close friendship that has always remained strictly platonic. She's always understood him better than anyone else, and he's always needed her in his life like he's never really needed anyone else.

"What happened, Red?" he asks, quietly, as she leans against him, his arm holding her close, because he's never seen her look so fragile. This is Merida Dunbroch, after all. She's always been tough and wild and brave, if a little self-absorbed, and it's a rare occasion when she's actually _fragile_. Even when she's upset, she lashes out, rages – but now it's like she's curled up on herself, and Bunny is scared and worried and he's never seen his best friend like this.

(She certainly was happy a week ago, when he saw her last, and they were in some MacDonald's because they both agree fast food is one of the best things ever invented.)

"Hans," she tells him, and he can feel her take a deep breath, and swallow, as his face turns into a scowl. Hans is Merida's boyfriend, a pompous, fucked-up arsehole that Bunny _cannot_ stand being around. He's never known what it is Merida sees in the guy. Her past boyfriends have never been this bad. He liked Hiccup (the guy was a nice guy, very sweet on Merida and very interesting and sarcastic) and he liked Eret (who'd been a bit stuck up, but he'd definitely cared a lot for Merida) and even Snotlout and McIntosh and McGuffin hadn't been that bad. But Hans – Hans, he thinks, is a complete prick and Bunny will never understand why Merida agreed to go out with that dickhead.

Bunny's arm closes around Merida, protectively. "What'd that fucker do?"

She leans in against him, rests her head on his chest. "Cheating on me," she says, finally. "Fucking cheating."

Something clenches in Bunny's chest, then, because _how dare Hans do that_? If there is anything that Merida is, she is brave and honest and loyal. He cannot even think about why anyone would cheat on Merida, would even want to cheat on Merida. When she cares for someone, she cares deeply. She is probably one of the most amazing girls in the whole damn world, and she deserves the _best_. And complete fucked-up dick _cheated_ on her.

He thinks of Hans' smug face, and there is a sudden urge in him to smash it into a pulp.

"That bastard," Bunny lets out his breath in a long, low hiss, and he is suddenly very _aware _of just how furious he is, how mad and angry he is with that stupid, stuck-up, arrogant pig. If there is one thing that Bunny knows Merida will never forgive, it is cheating and lying.

"Yeah," Merida says, and her voice comes out as something like a sniffle, and Bunny realises that she must've been crying. But of course she has been – she doesn't take well to lies and deceit. And she cares about Hans. "He was cheating on me with – with some girl in his office. The daughter of the owner, or something." She lets out a low, hoarse laugh. "Anna Arendelle. She didn't have any idea that I'm – that I was Hans' girlfriend. She was so – so upset…"

Her voice trails off, then, and she buries her face in Bunny's chest again.

"You broke it off with that dickface, then," Bunny says.

She nods, her mane of wild red curls bobbing up and down, and she lifts her head, slightly. "I didn't want to go back to my family," she admits. "They live hours away. And the triplets already took over my room. And you know what my mum's like."

Bunny remembers Elinor Dunbroch. A very forceful woman, he thinks.

"So I brought my stuff over," Merida says, and she points to the suitcase and the few bags that were hidden on the other side of the bed, out of sight of the door. She looks up at him, worry in her blue eyes: "Do you – do you mind?"

"Hell, no," Bunny says. "Stay here as long as you want, Red. If you can put up living with four guys."

She laughs a bit, then, softly, but Bunny feels happier when he hears that laugh. It's not her chortling, or the loud, raucous laughter that she usually breaks out in, but it's something. Merida's tough, she always has been, when it comes to her heart, she's not like that at all.

He thinks of that stupid cheating _fucker _Hans and his face darkens.

And then he looks back at Merida, still curled up in his bed next to him, the light from the TV screen flickering over her face.

"Stay as long as you want, Red," he repeats. "As long as you need."

* * *

><p>They talk, late into the night, until Merida finally falls asleep.<p>

Bunny pulls his blanket over her, and then he digs out one of his jackets and a spare pillow he's found and he wanders out into the living room and shut the door, softly, behind him, turning off his bedroom light.

When he turns to enter the living room, there are three very curious guys looking back at him.

"Dude," Rider asks. He is leaning against the wall, his arms crossed. "Who is _she_?"

"Merida," says Bunny, shortly. "One of my best mates from when I was in high school."

"I didn't know you have a girlfriend," says Jack, who looks slightly offended, because out of all of them he's always been the closest to Bunny.

Bunny scoffs, rolls his eyes. _Everyone _thinks Merida is his girlfriend. It's something he's gotten used to.

"She's not my girlfriend," he explains, patiently. "She left her fucker of a boyfriend, and she needs a place to stay."

His face darkens, again, slightly, as he thinks of Hans.

"Wait, wait, wait," says Lightning. Bunny thinks, again, how ridiculous his blond friend's name is. "She's staying _here_?"

"Yes," Bunny tells them. "I'm taking the couch."

Lightning glances around the messy apartment, and then shrugs, and turns his mind to more important things: "So she's single?"

"McQueen!" Bunny flings the pillow at his head, and Lightning topples over onto the couch just behind him. "Don't you even _think _about making a move on her."

He thinks of the redheaded Scottish heiress sleeping in his room, and he remembers all the boyfriends she's had. They've always been guys he's never known before, and he can't imagine how weird it would be to have one of his friends try and flirt with her. Beyond weird, he thinks. Besides, she needs to recover from the crap that Hans put her through - she's here _to _get over the crap that Hans put her through.

And it's not like he'll ever let his mates make a move on her. No way. He nearly shudders at the thought.

"Okay, okay," Lightning says, raising his head and putting his hands up, but Bunny has a feeling Lightning's not giving up that easily.

He doesn't really care. Merida needs a place to stay, and to fix up her heart, and as far as Bunny is concerned, she's going to get better here.

* * *

><p>Merida adapts quickly to living with four guys.<p>

She's no Snow White who cleans up after them, and while in many ways she acts like one of the guys, she has her limits. She doesn't let them leave their trash or empty takeaway boxes on the floor, she makes them put their clothes into the laundry, and once in a while she cleans up the house a bit.

She thinks, guiltily, of how she's practically forced herself on them. Turning up in their apartment one night, keeping Bunny up talking to her, and taking his bed while he sleeps on the couch with a jacket over him to keep him warm. She's insisted that he take back his bed, but he just looks at her and doesn't say a word and makes her take it anyway.

She tries not to think of Hans. He still calls her every day, and every night she can expect to see over fifty texts from him, but she deletes every one and she never picks up a single call. As far as she knows, he can go burn in hell. She wants to be mad at Anna Arendelle, too, but it's not easy to be when it's clear the girl's completely distraught about the fact that Hans was already in a relationship when he slept with her. Merida knows that Anna's cut off all contact with Hans, too.

It hurts, when she thinks of him. She knows Bunny has never understood why she got together with him (just like how she's never understood why he ever went out with that Aurora girl; sure, she was pretty, but she was a complete bitch), but she does – no, _did_ care for Hans.

She supposes it's a good thing that Bunny and his flat-mates can distract her so easily.

She's never met them before, even though Bunny's been living with them for nearly two years and she still meets him every weekend. Jack Frost is a flirt – he works at the skating rink and makes passes on everything in a skirt, and he's made her laugh more than once with his cheesy pick-up lines that makes the rest of the guys in the apartment facepalm. Flynn is a sports coach in the high school, and Merida is surprised to find that he's dating one of her friends, Rapunzel, who works at the hospital. Lightning must be the worst flirt of all, she thinks, but she has to admit that he really is kind of charming in his own way. He does use cheesy pick-up lines too, lines which either make her grin or wince, which makes Bunny roll his eyes every time and whack his friend on the back of his head.

But it's Bunny she appreciates most of all. He takes her out for dinner, some days, to eat Italian and Japanese and Chinese and all sorts of exotic food, and he brings her out for ice cream and makes her walk around in the park with him and they go see cool, artistic shops together, or check out sports equipment, or they find some cafe where he can mark his essays and worksheets and plan his lessons and Merida figures out schedules and horses and plans.

He makes sure she's doing okay, he makes sure she's happy. Some mornings he'll make breakfast for her, some days he'll buy back dessert when they've all elected to eat in the apartment. Some evenings they curl up on Bunny's bed that is really now Merida's with an old movie, after she's had a long day at work (thank God she's got flexible working hours) or he's tired out by all the emotional teenagers he tries to teach art to. Some days they just end up talking, or bickering, or laughing, and Merida is so, _so _grateful for the day that she met Aster Bunnymund.

It's a week before Bunny decides that he'll go back with her, after work, every day.

He'll drop her off in the morning, on his way to school, telling her that he doesn't mind getting up early and besides, he'll have stuff to work on once he reaches his school anyway. When he ends, he'll come by and wait for her to finish up, or some days, she'll be waiting for him. Some days, she lets him take Angus; he's the only one she'll ever trust with her bike.

Merida practically runs the stables, and she's got sharp ears, so she knows what her co-workers say: he's Australian, he's attractive, he's so strong, he's incredibly handsome and sweet and kind, and he's a much better choice than Hans. A couple of them are a little in love with Bunny, she thinks, who grins at them and nods his head awkwardly while he waits for her, and who does his best to make small talk when he's found a place to sit down and grade his essays even though he's really, really bad at small talk.

Merida chooses to ignore her co-workers' gossip. _Everyone _thinks she and Bunny are together. She's grown used to it.

And, day by day, she gets a bit better, a little happier. The guys make her laugh like every day is a huge joke they've got to make the most out of, they cheer her up and dare her to do all sorts of stupid things, and sometimes she thinks they're preschool kids or teenagers and not working adults. And she knows, too, that every time she turns around, Bunny will be there, looking at her with those intense green eyes and a half-smile, and she knows that there's nowhere else she would rather be.

It's another two weeks when Hans appears.

* * *

><p>He turns up just as she's ending off and leaving the horses in the stables, in his stupid black car and wearing some fancy shirt and pants, looking awkward and out of place where she's most in her element, covered and splattered with mud and dirt and sweat, her hair a bushy, tangled mess.<p>

When she finally grabs her stuff and locks up and turns around and catches sight of him, she stops and stares.

He stares back at her.

"Hi," he says.

She doesn't even look at him, she just marches right past him to the spot outside where she usually waits for Bunny. For the love of God, she thinks, why can't he be early today?

(She knows why, of course. He's got some art pieces to grade that he doesn't want to bring back to the apartment.)

"Merida," Hans says, his voice pleading.

"Fuck off."

She doesn't want to see him. She wants him to go away, and back off, and leave her alone. She can feel her heart twisting up inside her chest, and it hurts _so badly_, and she's so mad at herself because she still cares for him even though he cheated on her, and lied to her about it without batting an eyelash.

"Merida, I'm so sorry – "

"No, you're not," she says, her voice like acid. "You're just sorry you got caught."

"Merida, I swear, I didn't mean to – "

"Yes, you did," she says. "You slept with her so you'd have a chance of getting promoted. You think I don't know that? You fucking _lied _to me, Hans, to my face."

"Merida – "

And then there is the loud roar of an engine, and Merida is so relieved because it's Bunny, sitting astride Angus, skidding to a halt in front of her.

As soon as the dust clears, there is tension in the air, thick and pulsing.

"Hans," Bunny says, shortly, as he removes the helmet.

"Aster."

Hans is the only one who ever calls Bunny 'Aster'. Merida knows it's because they have never gotten along. She can see Hans taking in the fact that Bunny is driving Angus, whom Merida didn't even let him go near, taking in the fact that Merida is now moving up to climb up onto the bike behind Bunny.

Hans' face darkens.

"So you're with him now?" he asks Merida, choosing to ignore the big Australian man whom he's always despised.

Merida thinks of ignoring him, but decides against it. "No," she tells him, shortly, and then she turns to Bunny: "Can we go now?"

* * *

><p>That night, Bunny orders in pizza and he and Merida curl up in his bed, and they watch <em>Dead Poets' Society <em>because Merida really doesn't want to watch anything with much of a romance in it, and because Bunny thinks she needs a movie after what happened, even though he's still got essays to grade. She doesn't say much that day, just keeping to herself, and Bunny wonders if there's more to her leaving Hans than him just cheating on her.

"You're not telling me everything, are you, Red?" he asks her, when the movie's over, and the pizza's all gone. "About what happened between you and Hans."

She turns her face away, and Bunny knows, then, that she hasn't told him the whole truth, the entire truth.

"I don't really want to talk about it," she says, quietly.

Silence and privacy is something Bunny can respect. Outside, he can hear Rider and Jack arguing, can hear Lightning asking them to shut up so he can watch the basketball game in peace, but right now all that really matters is the silence settling over the room.

He takes her hand, forces her to stop moving.

"You know you can talk to me," he says. "Whenever you need to."

Merida smiles at him, and she squeezes his hand, and then she slugs him on the shoulder, gently. "I know," she says, softly. "Thanks, Bunny."

* * *

><p>It's after they clear up the empty boxes and the plastic Coke bottles that she asks, quietly: "Can you stay with me, tonight?"<p>

He looks at her in surprise, for a moment, but she's looking away slightly, and her face looks so strange and fragile and just a bit broken that Bunny doesn't even question it. He might not be able to make her tell him what happened between her and Hans, but he _can _be there for her, just like how she's always been there for him.

So that night, they fall asleep together, curled up, facing each other.

And when they wake up in the morning, Merida's in Bunny's arms, and she sends him a grateful smile and a whispered "Thank you".

* * *

><p>So every night they crash in Bunny's bedroom together, night after night after night. The guys don't say anything when they see Bunny emerge from the room in the morning, and they don't say anything when Merida appears as well.<p>

Hans doesn't show up again at work, and Merida loses her broken look and becomes a bit more cheerful, and she and Bunny sometimes spend the afternoons together at the park or in a café or with papers sprawled across the messy apartment table, him looking through essays and worksheets and Merida managing and planning out schedules and dealing with paperwork.

It's another couple of weeks when Hans shows up again, this time on a Friday, and this time he asks Merida out on a date.

"Please," he tells her, when he sees her clench her fists and take a deep breath. "One chance. One last chance. Just for dinner. It's just to talk. Please, Merida."

And she wants to say no, but something twists in her chest and she says, "Okay."

So they make arrangements and Hans says he'll make reservations in some fancy restaurant at eight and Merida says she'll meet him at the corner of the street where she stays with Bunny and his mates because she doesn't really want Hans to know exactly where she's living now.

When Bunny arrives to fetch her, after Hans drives off, Merida tells him what she's agreed to.

He nearly rams his car into a truck right in front of him.

"You can't do this, Merida," Bunny tells her, is still saying to her, hours later, when they're back in the apartment and Merida is hunting for a classy outfit through her clothes. "Why are you agreeing to go out with that dickhead again?"

"It's closure," she says. "I _need _to do this. And besides, I don't want him turning up at the stables again."

Bunny thinks this is wrong, that this is very very wrong and it is a terrible idea and he wants to tell Merida that she _can't _go out with Hans because he's a fucked-up arsehole and he's not worth her time, and what's more, that Hans doesn't deserve her because she is worth so much more than him. And he tries to argue, tries to persuade her, but she's adamant that she has to do this, and Bunny wonders if maybe he's going about this the wrong way, because he of all people should know how stubborn and rebellious Merida is.

In the end he gives up and wanders into the living room sullenly, moodily, where Flynn has just gotten home and Jack is sprawled on the couch because he doesn't work on Fridays.

Merida spends what feels like hours in the bathroom, and the whole time, Bunny is pacing the living room, the hallway, the kitchen, muttering to himself and cursing that fucktard Hans while Jack watches and Flynn works on strategies for some game his team has next week, and Lightning calls up to say he's thinking of heading to the gym.

When no one wants to go with him, he heads straight to the apartment where Jack tells him everything, and then it's Lightning who sits with Jack as they watch Bunny pace.

"He's got it bad," Lightning whispers to Jack.

Jack nods. "He doesn't even know it."

* * *

><p>When Merida finally appears, her hair has been somewhat tamed and forced into an elegant braid, and she's in a slinky black dress that makes all four guys' jaws drop.<p>

For Bunny, it's the biggest surprise of all. He doesn't usually see Merida in anything but ragged jeans and shorts and tank tops and shirts, and occasionally a dressy sort of shirt with black pants or a plain skirt, and he's _never _seen her like this.

"You're wearing _that_?" Jack's voice is nearly a squeak.

Merida frowns, and she turns a bit. "Is something wrong?" she asks, and it's her accent, her thick Scottish accent that Bunny's always known, that brings him back to where he is.

"You look _great_," Bunny manages to croak out. She does, she looks amazing, but it's somehow not her, even though she looks beautiful. He thinks that he likes her better in her jeans and her shirts, with her hair exploding in curls around her face.

She smiles at him, and her smile is just a little shy. "Thanks."

He and Jack walk her out to the corner of the street, where Hans' black car is waiting. Hans barely acknowledges them, but Bunny watches with something aching in his chest as Merida slides into the front seat, and he stands there on the pavement as he watches the car drive away.

Jack just shakes his head to himself.

* * *

><p>It's past midnight when Flynn's phone rings.<p>

Bunny is still awake, waiting for Merida to call him, to let him know where she is, to ask him to come down and walk with her back to the apartment. He's trying to mark essays, but the words swirl across the paper until he can't make anything out, and he watches TV instead, endless, stupid shows that flash across the screen and glare into his eyes.

Jack's waiting up with him, but he's nearly asleep now, sprawled on the floor with a bowl of popcorn. Bunny doesn't even feel sleepy, his eyes constantly flicking to his phone next to him.

When Flynn staggers out of his bedroom, the one he shares with Lightning, Bunny doesn't think, at first, that it's got anything to do with him.

But then Flynn looks at him, his eyes wide and in shock, and he tells them that it's Rapunzel, calling from the hospital, and that they've just brought in Merida Dunbroch and that she thinks Bunny should know.

* * *

><p>The streets are quiet, but Bunny speeds through them so that the engine roars, and behind him Jack and Lightning and Flynn cling onto the seats for dear life as the car skids across the streets, on the fastest route to the hospital.<p>

When they get there, Rapunzel is waiting, and the only person she allows to go in is Bunny. Merida's parents and family have been informed, she tells them, but they stay hours away and they'll only be here the next day, and Merida's been asking for Bunny ever since she woke up so Rapunzel thinks it'll be all right to let him go in.

When he sees her, he thinks his heart might stop. Her face is puffy and bruised, blue and purple and black, her arm is broken and so are her fingers, and he can only vaguely take in the doctor's words that she's broken a couple of ribs and there's some fractures and a whole lot of other medical nonsense that he isn't really listening to.

He drops into the seat by the bed, places his own large, warm hand over her now-fragile one.

"Bunny," she whispers, her lips twisted, the words coming out all strange. Her hair's not in that braid anymore, he notices, and she's dressed in some kind of hospital gown.

"Merida," he says, and his voice comes out in a ragged sigh. She looks broken, fragile, like she could fall apart at any moment, and he's so mad, so angry at himself because _he should have been there for her __but he wasn't. _

They don't say much, because it's too painful for her to talk, but he sits there next to her until she finally falls into sleep, and he doesn't move, his hand still resting gently on hers.

He sees Rapunzel approaching, from the other side of the bed.

"What happened?" he asks, his voice hoarse. "Was it a car accident? Where's Hans?"

He sees Rapunzel bite her lip.

"It wasn't a car accident," she says, finally, just when Bunny's about to jump up and demand for answers because the silence is ominous, far too ominous. "And Hans – Hans is spending the night in a police cell. He's – he's the one who did this to her, Bunny."

"He – what?"

Bunny stares at her, and there is something rising up in him, anger and rage and fury and he wants to pummel Hans into the fucking ground.

Rapunzel winces, and nods. "It's not the first time, either," she says, quietly. "She's got injuries from before this."

And then all Bunny can do is stare at Merida, stare at her as she sleeps, her face a painful mess of colours, lying fragile and delicate, and he doesn't know whether he wants to scream or to cry.

* * *

><p>The next day, the Dunbrochs arrive. It's Fergus and Elinor who rush into the room first, looking distraught and upset and exhausted from spending the night driving, followed by red-headed triplets.<p>

He can see that they're surprised to see him there, but then their eyes fall on Merida and Elinor lets out a horrified gasp and Fergus clenches his fists and the triplets' faces darken. Bunny knows he should leave, but he doesn't want to.

It's Jack who finally guides him away, gently, bringing him a coffee as they wait outside the room while Elinor and Fergus watch their only daughter and the triplets blast the nurses and doctors for information.

Bunny doesn't leave the whole day, until Jack makes him head back and shower and maybe get something nice for Merida, or else he'll stink up the hospital. Bunny glances back, once, to make sure Merida isn't alone, and sees her brothers around her bed, so he nods and he lets Jack take him back to the apartment.

When he comes back, he's showered and fresh and clean and he's eaten, and he's brought a huge bouquet of bright, colourful flowers, and the nurses smile at him and place them by her bed.

"I didn't expect to see you here," Elinor says, as Bunny sinks into a chair he's dragged over, so he can sit next to her.

He nods, a little numbly. "Mrs Dunbroch," he says. "She's been living with me and my mates for the past couple of weeks."

"We thought she was living with Hans," Fergus says, and Bunny sees his face twist when he says the name, anger clear and bright.

"She was," Bunny tells them. "But she left him, and she didn't want to go back to you and make you worry about her, so she stayed with me instead. She didn't want to give up her job, either."

Elinor nods, and she sighs, and she clasps her hands together.

"You've always been there for her," she tells Bunny, gently. "Even though she wants to be independent and thinks she's capable of doing everything alone. You're the only one she ever lets in. Thank you."

"It's the least I can do," Bunny tells them, because it is; because he cannot imagine a life without Merida Dunbroch and her stinging comments and her loud laughter and the way she makes everything right. "She's my best mate."

Hubert, Hamish and Harris look up sharply at that, but they don't say anything, and after a while, they go back to looking at their sister's face.

Bunny doesn't see Elinor and Fergus glance over at the flowers he's brought, at the way he sits by her bed like he never wants to leave, because all he can see is Merida, slowly breathing in and out, and at the bruises and bandages that cover her, and he asks himself again why he let her go.

* * *

><p>Jack makes Bunny go back to work, but the Australian always comes down the minute he's free.<p>

And slowly, day by day, week by week, Merida heals. Her bruises fade, her bones get fixed, there's colour in her face and light in her eyes. She begins to smile, she even laughs.

She presses charges, and Hans gets punished accordingly, and even though Bunny's hands are still itching to beat him into a pulp, he's satisfied, because after all, the only thing that really matters is Merida, and she never wants to see Hans again.

When she's fully healed, her parents try to urge her to go back with them.

When Bunny hears that, he feels like something is twisting in his chest and it hurts. He watches as Merida walks, gingerly, down the hospital corridors, her parents beside her, her brothers behind her, and Bunny just behind them.

She stops in the middle of the corridor.

"I don't want to," she tells them. "I love you, but I can't. My life is here, now. And Hans is gone. I love you all, but I'm not heading back with you."

"You need somewhere to heal," Elinor insists. "How about this - it's nearly summer. Tell them you'll take the summer off, come with us back to Scotland for a few months. You need to get this whole nightmare behind you."

"Summer's the busiest time of the year at the stables," Merida argues, but Elinor's voice is pleading and even Fergus looks worried, and Bunny can see her faltering.

Bunny wants her to get better. He really does. And even though she's healed, physically at least, she needs to recuperate. And this town, with all its noise and traffic and rush, is no place for her to heal, and his apartment with his friends isn't the most ideal place to stay, either.

But still, his chest aches. Summer. Three months. He won't even have to work, to get his mind off her, to busy himself with.

He can't imagine three months without Merida.

And then she glances over, looks at him, where he's standing quietly behind her brothers.

"Will you come?" she asks, suddenly, abruptly, and then her face flushes. "I mean, if I – if I go. And if – if you're free. I know you don't have to work during the summer, so – I mean – if you can – "

Bunny knows that her parents are looking at her, knows that her brother's eyes are flicking back and forth between the two of them; but the only thing he can really see is Merida, holding onto Fergus' arm, looking sad and tired and fragile, and asking him if he wants to spend the summer with her in Scotland.

"I don't have the money," he finds that he is saying.

"We'll pay," Elinor says, immediately. "It's not an issue."

(And Bunny knows it's not, because the Dunbrochs are filthy rich.)

There's a light in Elinor's eyes, but Bunny doesn't notice it, because he's still looking at Merida, who is still looking at him.

She asks, softly: "Will you?"

"If you want me there," he finds himself stammering, unsure, uncertain, even though his heart feels like it's exploding in a good way.

"I do," she says.

"Then I'll go," he says. "For as long as you need."

And then he finds himself smiling at her, and she is smiling at him, a careful, fragile smile, and her face lights up brilliantly.

He finds himself repeating: "As long as you need."

* * *

><p>One month passes, and then another. They go on picnics, the Dunbrochs and Bunny, and they go to the town, and they try Maudie's cooking, and they go exploring, Merida and Bunny, sometimes with the triplets, sometimes just the two of them.<p>

The triplets grow to like Bunny, whom they enjoy pranking, but Bunny thinks it's worth it, whenever he gets embarrassed or drenched in paint or put in an awkward situation thanks to the three little devils, because it always gets a laugh out of Merida.

Elinor grows to like him too, asking him about art and about classics and all sorts of things about art that Bunny has never had the chance to talk to anyone else about. And even Fergus grows to like him, watching games late into the night with him, drinking with him, eating with him.

It's during one of those drinking sessions that Fergus says: "You'll take care of her, won't you?"

"Who? Merida?"

And then Bunny thinks what a stupid question that is, because of course Fergus is talking about Merida.

"Aye," says Fergus. "You will, won't you?"

"I'm not planning to leave her any time soon," Bunny says. "She's my best mate."

"Aye," Fergus says, again, and there is a small smile on his face now: "Aye, your best mate…"

* * *

><p>One day, Bunny and Merida are looking through the woods, exploring, when they tumble into a large clearing, with tall grey stones standing in a circle.<p>

Merida tells him about the will-o'-the-wisps, that are meant to lead you to your fate.

"They led me here, before," she says. "When I was a child."

"To this circle of standing stones?" Bunny asks, looking around, confused.

"Actually," she admits, "I like to think that maybe they were leading me to right now."

She looks at him, then, and green eyes look into blue, and blue into green, and Bunny can see that the nightmare has faded for her. She is happy, she is bright and loud and cheerful and she is _Merida_, and his heart swells with happiness. That idiot Hans is all in the past, and all that matters is here and right now, the two of them standing together, the sun sinking across the sky as they stare out across the endless trees.

"Yeah?" he asks, because he's not sure what else is there to say.

"Yeah," she agrees.

And somewhere, somehow, their hands find each other, and everything is the same but everything is different.

* * *

><p><strong>note: yay! it's done. like i said. incoherent ramblings of a girl because this has been stuck in her mind the whole day. actually, it began with imagining aster coming home to find merida in his apartment and his friends around him. and then it sort of went BOOM. <strong>

**anyway, if there are factual inaccuracies or details that you think is weird like the fact that they are grown working adults sharing an apartment and that Bunny seems to have a lot of free time for a teacher and stuff like that, my answer is _pfft_. i can write what i want as long as it works. and besides, this is fanfiction. **

**anyway, am contemplating maybe changing this into a twoshot. you know, where the next chapter is when they're actually finally together (YAY) and not just insisting that they're best friends. and stuff happens because this is fanfiction. i don't know. maybe. should i? **


	2. Chapter 2

**I was trying to make this sad. I don't think I did it very well. Let's see how this goes. **

* * *

><p>When Merida gets the call from Rapunzel, she thinks, at first, that Rapunzel wants to go out for dinner, or for a movie, or to complain about Flynn. She nearly doesn't pick up at first, but after her phone continues to ring insistently, she finally sighs and picks it up.<p>

"Hello?" she says, tiredly, because she's exhausted and she's just cleaned up the house she and Bunny shares and she's really not in the mood to put up with Rapunzel's cheerfulness.

But Rapunzel's voice isn't optimistic, or happy, as it usually is.

"Merida," she says, and Merida snaps to attention then, because Rapunzel's voice is worried and trembling and she _knows_ there's something wrong. Even then, she thinks it's something to do with Flynn, or something. Even then, she thinks it's something that's happened to Rapunzel. "Merida, you have to come over."

Her voice is still shaking, trembling.

"Rapunzel," Merida says, firmly. "What happened?"

She hears Rapunzel take a deep breath, hears her shaky voice on the line: "It's Bunny."

* * *

><p>Merida's not really sure how she gets to the hospital without crashing into something. It's broad daylight, and the hospital is full of people who are either looking grim and worried or bright and happy and smiling, and she wants to snap at the latter group to <em>shut the fuck up <em>because she thinks her world might be falling into pieces around her.

She finally gets to the right ward, to the right room, where Rapunzel is waiting in her nurse's uniform, looking pale and scared and anxious.

"Where is he?" Merida demands, her voice unnaturally loud. "What's happened?"

"Car crash," Rapunzel says, and her voice is still trembling. "He was – he was driving, and this truck just hit him out of nowhere. Merida, I don't – " She stops, takes a watery, tearful gulp, and says " – I don't know if he can make it."

"No," Merida says, but her voice sounds hollow and empty, even to her. "No, no, _no_. Where is he?"

Quietly, Rapunzel leads her to Bunny's bedside.

She can only see his eyes, intense green and warm, and the half-smile on her lips, amid the midst of wires and tubes and drips and bandages and bruises and scratches and scars that cover him, and he looks so _broken_ and small there that she wants to scream and cry and yell.

"Red," he rasps out.

"Bunny," she says, and her voice is shaky and she doesn't quite know what to do, so she just pulls up her chair and sits down next to him and takes his hand, softly, gently.

For some reason, he chuckles, a hoarse, quiet chuckle.

"What?" she wants to know. "Why are you laughing, you complete idiot?"

"Do you remember," he asks, "that our positions were reversed, once? Three years ago?"

"I can't believe you're bringing that up, now," Merida tells him, but there is a shaky, fragile smile on her face. She knows what Bunny is talking about, of course.

She can still remember that dinner with Hans, how he'd pleaded with her to stay with him, to go back to him, that he was better and a changed man. She'd thought she would have to battle with her heart to say no – but it hadn't been very hard, surprisingly. She'd told him that she couldn't do it, that they were no good together, and that it was better this way for everyone.

She can remember him refusing to drop her off at the corner, hours later. She can remember finally just shoving the door open and kicking off her heels and running away, back down the many streets he'd passed by at a ridiculously, dangerously fast pace, trying to get away from him. She can remember him catching up, grabbing her, lashing out.

She forces that memory away, focusses on what came after.

_Bunny._

She can remember him visiting her, rushing over to the hospital, staying with her, by her side, bringing her flowers and chocolates and making her smile and laugh and just _being _there. She can remember days in Scotland, when everything was the same but everything was different, and he was always there for her, just like how he's always been, his whole life.

And now she's here for him.

"If you want to draw parallels," Bunny croaks out, "Rapunzel was the one who called up too, the last time."

"Shut up, yer daft idiot. You need to rest and get better."

"Rida." He smiles at her, a sad, small smile. "I'm not sure if I will be getting better."

He lets out a cough, a horrible, hoarse cough that wracks his body, and fear floods Merida.

"No," she says, stubbornly, insistently. "_No_. You're going to get better."

_I don't know if he can make it_, she remembers Rapunzel saying.

_No_. She pushes the thought aside. Bunny _can't _go. He _can't_.

"You're staying with me," she tells him. "Remember? As long as you need me. As long as I need you."

"As long as we need each other," he says, softly.

He smiles up at her again, sadly, a look in his eye like he knows something she doesn't, and he squeezes her hand.

"I love you," he whispers.

Her voice is ragged, her throat choked, as she whispers back: "I love _you_."

* * *

><p>Numbness.<p>

That's all she can feel.

Numbness, and coldness, and emptiness and darkness and just plain nothing surrounding her, engulfing her, and there's something painful and cold and heavy in her heart as she twists the fabric of the dress in her hands.

She doesn't know what to do.

She doesn't know what to feel.

And she has to swallow, because she keeps expecting to hear a laugh that's never coming, to see a smile that will never light up his face again, to feel a hand slide around her waist and pull her close _but is never going to happen_.

And she has to take a deep breath, because she can still see his smiling, laughing face in her mind's eye, and it's a face she's not going to see again.

* * *

><p><em>The kitchen is in a mess.<em>

_Bunny stares around the kitchen in shock. He's never seen anything quite like this, not even when Hubert and Harris and Hamish tried to cook something, or when he's let Jack loose in the kitchen. "Merida?" _

"_Before you ask, I am going to clean this up," a clear Scottish accent grumbles, and he sees Merida's mane of red hair appear from behind the table. "I thought you were going to be back late." _

"_I finished grading the art pieces early." He is still staring: "What happened?" _

"_I tried to bake," Merida admits. "It didn't turn out so well." _

_He blinks at her: "You tried to _bake_?" _

_Merida doesn't bake. She can cook a simple meal, to be sure, but she can't bake – not as far as he knows, anyway. She's horrible in the kitchen. Even Fergus doesn't dare touch anything she cooks, half the time. _

"_I'm not completely hopeless," she grumbles, and she brings out a batch of chocolate cakes. "Come on. Try one." _

_He eyes them warily. They look harmless enough, but he knows how deceiving appearances can be. _

_Merida frowns at him, and he thinks it's better for his own personal health to try one. _

_Tentatively, he reaches out, and, squeezing his eyes shut, bites into one._

_His eyes fly open as soon as he swallows: "These are really good!" _

"_Of course they are," Merida scoffs. "I'm not trying to poison you, you know." _

_He laughs. "What are they for, anyway?" _

"_You looked stressed," she admits. "From preparing for your artpiece for that exhibition, or competition, or something, and for all the grading you have to do. I mean, you come home every day and lock yourself up all the way until dinner time. So I thought I'd try to do something for you." _

_There's a warmth in his chest, for this blue-eyed Scottish girl holding out a tray of cupcakes, and he doesn't care that she's covered in flour and sugar and who-knows-what else; he grabs her to him and kisses her, hard._

"_I love you," he says, resting his head on top of hers. _

_She sighs, and wraps her arm tightly around him: "I love you too."_

* * *

><p>It's not right. Nothing is right. There are people in black, filling up this house where she and Bunny spent so many days together, laughing, messing around, playing. There is a familiar face that is Lightning McQueen's, his eyes dark and his whole face distraught, and there is someone she recognises as Hiccup, and she thinks that she sees Flynn, and then there's a long blond mess shaking in front of her that she knows is Rapunzel.<p>

"Oh, Merida," Rapunzel says, her voice soft and full of pain and scratchy. "I'm sorry. I'm so, so sorry."

Her hands clasp Merida's, and Merida can't bear it anymore. Her head falls onto Rapunzel's shoulder, onto that long blond braid that she always wears, and she is sobbing, sobbing quietly, because everything is _wrong_ and it feels like nothing will ever be right again.

He's not here.

* * *

><p><em>She's searching under her bed for her wallet – she's never going to tell Bunny she accidentally dropped her wallet on the floor and then kicked it under the bed – when she feels something like a shoebox, and she drags it out, curiously. <em>

_When Bunny peers into the bedroom, it's to see her cross-legged on the bed, sifting through old, yellowing papers that he recognises immediately. _

_His face flames red. "Merida!" _

"_Bunny, you naughty boy," she says. "Are these drawings of _me_?" _

"_You're not supposed to see that!" He jumps up onto the bed next to her, and tries to stow away the old drawings. They're a bit embarrassing for him – some of them were drawn when he was much younger, still sketching uncertainly and unsurely, some of them are sketches that make him feel like he'd been a stalker of some sort whenever he glances back at them again. _

_She laughs: "Are you embarrassed?" _

"_Yes," he growls. "There's a reason why they were under the bed." _

_He wants to shove them under the bed again, but she grabs him and drags him down onto the bed next to her. _

"_Merida," he complains. "I've still got lessons to plan – "_

"_Hey," she says. "I just discovered you keeping some very creepy old drawings from me that make me feel like I've been stalked. I think I need some comfort." _

_He catches the glint in her eyes then, and he wants to laugh at the ridiculousness of it all. _

"_Your wish is my command," he tells her, and he grabs her close and presses his lips on hers._

* * *

><p>"Merida."<p>

She can her a voice behind her now, a voice that is low and dark and so _painful _that she lifts her head and turns around.

And it is Jack. Of course it is Jack. He is dressed in black, and his face is empty and his eyes are hollow, and his face is gaunt and stricken and whiter-than-white.

"Jack," she says.

They don't say anything to each other, because the pain is there between them, raw and throbbing because Merida knows just how important Jack is in Bunny's life.

Not is. _Was_.

He doesn't say he's sorry. Neither does she.

Instead, he holds out his arms and Merida falls into them and then she's crying her heart out, her body wracking with sobs, and she can feel Jack shaking as well, shaking and trembling, and she buries her head on his shoulder.

_Bunny_.

Bunny is gone. Bunny is gone, and he is never coming back, and the last words he left her with are _I love you_.

And Bunny is dead.

He's not here anymore. No more grin, no more smirks, no more half-smiles; no more intense green gazes, no more mop of dark hair to ruffle; no more late movie nights, no more eating pizza curled up on the couch, no more trying to figure out what happened to their bills; no more laughing over stupid things, no more dragging each other playfully into the shower when she comes back drenched in mud and dirt and he's covered in paint and marker ink and sand, no more wrestling with each other until it's just him and her and the world's ceased to exist around them.

No more Bunny.

_Dead_.

_Gone_.

And she doesn't know whether to scream or to cry because he is _dead and gone and never coming back_.

* * *

><p>It's when everybody leaves that Jack finds her, still curled up on the sofa, her hands clutching at her arms.<p>

"He's not gone, you know," Jack says, finally. "Not really."

"No," she whispers. "He's not. But he's not here."

* * *

><p>"<em>Hey, Red," Bunny is looking up at her, over his ice cream, his face suddenly just a bit anxious and worried. "I have a proposal for you."<em>

"_I think we need to be dating first, Bunny, before you bring up marriage." Merida is trying to figure out paperwork she can't really understand, and she's not really looking up, and she's annoyed because she can hear the stupid basketball game that the other guys are yelling about. _

"_Not that, you idiot. But, uh – I was thinking of moving out." _

_Her head shoots up, at that. "Moving out? Of the apartment?" _

_It's ridiculous. Incredible. This apartment that she's somehow made her own, this apartment that she shares with Bunny and Lightning and Jack and Flynn?_

"_Yeah." _

"_Why?" she demands. _

"_Because – " he swallows a bit, and then rushes on: "I kinda wanted to get my own place, mate. And I kind of want you to, uh, maybe stay with me." _

_She looks at him, a long, slow look; and Bunny shifts in his seat nervously, his heart beating rapidly. _

_And then Merida leans forward, across the table, and she kisses him. _

_She kisses him long, and slow, and hard, and Bunny's not really quite sure when his own eyes fall shut and he's kissing back, until they finally break away, wide blue eyes staring into green. _

"_So – " he swallows, and he can still taste her on his lips, chocolate and apples and warmth. "Is that a – is that a yes?" _

"_Yes, you idiot," she breathes, and her eyes are bright and sparkling and Bunny thinks he just might be melting into his seat. "Of course I will." _

_And then she kisses him again, and he's kissing her back, and neither of them notice Lightning and Flynn tiptoeing away, Flynn grumbling as he slides some money into Lightning's hands._

* * *

><p>Jack clears his throat, and he glances around the house. Everywhere there are reminders of Bunny – the endless photos, the decoration, the ornaments, the canvas and the paints and the sketchbooks, everywhere. It hasn't been long, not very long, since Bunny left. But there is a huge empty hole in his heart.<p>

He thinks, that maybe, just maybe, Bunny will walk through that door and cross his arms and demand, a smirk on his face, exactly what his best friend is doing with his girlfriend, before he slips his hand around Merida's waist and claims the Scottish girl for his own.

But Bunny won't be walking through that door anymore. Because he's not coming back. Not anymore.

And it hurts. It hurts so much.

"Bunny asked me to pass you this," Jack says, finally, taking a battered envelope out of his pocket and sliding it into Merida's hands. "He got me to – to do some stuff for him, while he was in the hospital, before he – before he died."

He swallows again.

"I have to go," he says, in a hoarse voice that doesn't really sound like his own. "I need to – I need to go. Goodnight, Merida."

And he's out of the house in a flash, shutting it behind him, because it's too painful and he can still see the laughing green eyes of his best friend in his mind.

Merida takes out a letter, first. It's written in Jack's handwriting, that's unmistakeable, but the words are Bunny's and she can feel her heart clench.

* * *

><p><em>Hey, Red. <em>

_I don't have a lot of time left, so here's just something for you. _

_And here is the most important thing I need to tell you – DON'T YOU DARE STOP LIVING_.

_I don't mean commit suicide. I mean make sure you live. I'm not going to last long. I know that. I'm trying to fight, for you, I'm trying to hang on as long as I can, but I don't know how much longer I've got. Kind of stupid way to die, huh – getting hit by a truck? _

_I want to tell you I'm sorry. I'm sorry I let myself get killed and that I'm letting myself die and that I'm not going to be around for you anymore. Forgive me, okay? Please? _

_Red, you're one of the strongest people I know. And you're going to continue to be. And don't you dare be anything else. _

_You are and always will be the best thing that's ever happened to me. _

_But I don't want to be the best thing that's ever happened to you. You go out there, and you find some way to be happy, you hear me? Or I'm going to haunt you from the grave. You get out there, and you go and smile again and be happy. Because you are my entire world, Red, and if you're not happy, well, I'm never going to be at peace, either. _

_I want to tell you I love you. _

_But you know that already. _

_But I like saying it so much, so I'll say it again. _

_I love you, Merida. _

_(Maybe in another life, we'll grow old and have little redheaded devils of kids with Australian accents. But that's another life. And I'm counting on you to make the most out of this life that you have left.)_

_I love you._

_Love, _

_Bunny._

* * *

><p>She has to take a deep breath, and she wants to scream and cry and yell at the whole damn world because she is <em>not prepared <em>for this and she _cannot cope _with Bunny being gone, and she wants to throttle that _stupid Australian guy _because she thinks her heart is just hurting even more now and cracking into two.

She's vaguely aware of tears sliding down her face, of gasping and sobbing and the words becoming a blur in her eyes.

Everything is wrong and broken and she thinks that nothing will ever be okay again.

She's about to fling the stupid, dirty envelope into the cushions when she realises that there's something else inside, and she drags out a small, square paper.

_One last thing, Red. _

_I thought it would be a waste not to give you what I ended up dying for. _

_You would have said yes, wouldn't you?_

_Bunny_.

Merida doesn't want to know what it is, she wants to throw away the envelope because _nothing is worth dying for_, but instead, carefully, cautiously, she tips the envelope over.

A ring tips out onto her palm. A gold ring, with a shining silver diamond.

Merida knows what it is immediately.

An engagement ring.

And then it feels like her heart is breaking all over again, cracking into a million little pieces, but she's not sure if that's what's really happening because she also thinks that there is an empty, hollow place where her heart should be.

"Fuck you," she murmurs, and then she is shaking again, and she is so cold and sad and lonely and she wants to just cry and cry and cry: "Fuck you. Yes, you stupid, annoying kangaroo. _Yes_."

* * *

><p><strong>So, I mean, I don't know, I kind of wrote this for fun in, like, an hour? An hour and a half? <strong>

**Let me know what you think I guess haha**


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